


Black Holes and Revelations

by TightropeFlea



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst, Depression, F/M, Hopper needs a hug, Internal Conflict, Introspection, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Esteem Issues, Self-Hatred
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-05
Updated: 2019-07-05
Packaged: 2020-06-09 20:51:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,950
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19483801
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TightropeFlea/pseuds/TightropeFlea
Summary: If there has ever been a way to self destruct, Jim has tried it. And he usually succeeds, even now. Then when the high of it wears off, there's nothing left but self hatred.Jim Hopper dealing (or not dealing) with his demons in Season 3. (Spoilers, obviously)





	Black Holes and Revelations

# "Three inches,"

Sitting now with a beer in one hand and popcorn in the other, Jim Hopper takes a quick stock of his life.

Vietnam. A dead daughter. A broken marriage. A string of drunken escapades. A lost little boy. A lost little girl - no, a daughter. A shadowy government group. An ex - no, a mother - no, a _best friend_ \- with trauma.

All of those things have one thing in common - him. He knows this just as well as he knows that the sky is blue and bears shit in the woods. He is, always has been, and probably always will be cursed. The people around him will all eventually crumble and fall into it - the black hole - while he stays standing, listening to it destroy everything.

It manifests in ways that he feels helpless to - always starting with a rumble like thunder, beating with his heart and drowning out his ears. Then it quickly turns to a complete lack of control, bred from actions and words he should be able to manage.

Before Sara, it was recklessness at work. The occasional scotch after a long day. Enough to make eyebrows raise, but not enough for anyone (except him) to be hurt. After Sara it was worse. Bottles of whiskey, never ending alternating periods of silence or shouting with Diane. Doors slamming, packed suitcases. 

Then came the Tuinal. Too much of it. To combat that, coffee. Then beer and smoking. To release the caffeinated, drunken energy? Women. Anything to quiet the roar of the black hole, anything to give him some semblance of control.

If there has ever been a way to self destruct, Jim has tried it. And he usually succeeds, even now. Then when the high of it wears off, there's nothing left but self hatred. When you hate yourself, it's all under your control. Self sabotage is its own control

In the more recent past, on nights when he drank too much, he told El about it. Usually she sat quietly with him, listening to his guilty slurred rambling without being able to answer. Just another drop in the bucket of things he feels guilty about - bringing the damn kid down with him. 

He was grateful for it, though. When they sat together and quietly watch westerns, Hopper would sneak looks down at his adopted daughter. Her dark eyes would be intent on the movie, her hands and mouth full of popcorn. He remembers her holding his hand and proclaiming in her quiet way that she had his back. It was so pure a moment, so emphatic that he could have sworn that she had blonde hair in pigtails. It was enough to keep the destructive force inside of him at bay.

He had been given a second chance, and he had sworn that he was _not_ going to fuck this one up. 

All of that is past tense, of course. As far as Hopper is concerned, he hasn't fucked up yet. Now, though, he's trying to count backwards from 100 while listening to Rooster Cogburn serve a writ to a rat. And El isn't here, because she's holed herself up in the room with Wheeler.

 _There's a rat that deserves a writ,_ he thinks with a scowl, listening to the black hole rumble in his ears as it drowns out the numbers and gunshots.

The sound is the worst part, coming in higher and higher waves, clouding his judgement. Narrowing his field of vision and pulling him back into his mind, deep enough where he feels like he's unable to control his raised voice. Not deep enough to blind him to the hurt look on El's face when he bursts through the door, disrupting her privacy.

# "You wanna have dinner tonight?"

Sometimes, he does stupid things before the black hole starts roaring. Usually, this happens when he's around Joyce Byers. The noises in his head are quieter when he's with her, asking for help and joking about killing that damn Wheeler kid. It's easy not to focus on the distant hum when her eyes are bright, smile wide enough to show her dimples. When he was younger, he used to make her laugh so that he could swoop in and pepper those dimples with kisses. Now, with her hand on his, he doesn't see any reason not to repeat the past.

_The past._

The hum starts to build then, in the quiet moment after he asks her to dinner. He feels it vibrating through him like the growl of some great beast, ready to steal that smile from her. Ready to take this moment and any future moments. 

He doesn't argue when she hops down from the counter. All he can do is watch how the sunlight turns her brown hair gold, and berate himself for burning his wings, flying too close to her sun.

\---

It doesn't go away, after that. 

Every moment of the day is filled with white noise, increasing in volume. The black hole is behind the headache that deepens, the spots of light behind his eyes.

It hisses through Jim's teeth when he threatens Mike Wheeler. It simmers when he insists to a skittish Joyce that no, this isn't a date. It thrums when he orders drinks, and by the time he's stumbling drunkenly up his front porch, it's deafening again.

# "Glass houses, Joyce"

Shame burns through him immediately, and if Hopper were a better man than he knows he is, he would stop egging her on. He would apologize, cup her face in his hands, and plead forgiveness. Anything to stop the immediate affront and the way she reels back from him.

"What." 

Why is it, he considers amidst the white noise of the hole, that every angry woman in his life pops the 't,' in 'what?'

"You know, pot calling the kettle black."

"Oh, come on." 

It gets louder now, the ambient noise becoming a more familiar thrum. He's never called her crazy. Never stooped as low as Lonnie or his deputies. Not really. A joke here or there, of course. An affectionate dig maybe, when he's spilled too much of himself out to her. Something to lighten the mood after he's shown too many cards, or all but told her he loves her in so many words. 

This feels different. This is wrong, and Hopper knows it, but the black hole is humming in his ears. He's unable to stop his mouth but he knows he's pushing her away. Trying to keep her from getting too close. Joyce is exhausted, her hair a frizzy mess in the July heat. She's shaking her head, dropping his gaze as though guilty, about to argue -

"Excuse me!" 

They both snap to attention, glaring at Murray as Jim heard himself spit out a single, "What?"

"Do me a favor and move your lovers' quarrel elsewhere."

The hum intensifies, and were it not so distracting or Hopper so angry, he'd hear both of them snap back an answer. It's too quick to be real, too vehement to be believed.

The sound grows and grows until Joyce is there, fury draping her like the sexiest gown he would kill to get her out of. Once she pushes past Murray, Jim finds himself wondering - not for the first time - how loud _her_ demons are.

# “On your life, Magnum!” 

They’re pushed back into the soft wall, and Hopper slams into it with an angry curse. He remembers Bob the Brain telling him in high school about gravity. Some force - Centennial? Centrifugal? - presses him to the wall, lifting him off of his feet.

Murray's words bubbles back to the surface, drowning out the carnival music and black hole. _Probably reminds you of a bad relationship._ The comparison between himself and Lonnie makes Hopper more nauseous than any shitty ride ever will. He deserves it.

Joyce is next to him, arm pressed down against his. He eyes her for a moment, frustration giving way to a more nervous energy. He wants - needs - to know that she doesn't feel trapped in this stupid spinning top with him. 

_Are you okay, Joyce?_ He doesn't open his mouth, too overwhelmed by the pressure around him and the din in his ears.

She must sense his eyes on her. For the first time in two hours, Joyce looks at him. There's discomfort on her face, but beyond it is a thinly veiled concern. It's a look he's seen a thousand times before, so normal that it makes the corners of his mouth twitch into a pained grin.

It was reserved for Jonathan, in handcuffs at the station. The narrowing of her wide eyes, squinting hard as if she needs to be absolutely sure of his safety. Will has received it too, more often. When he drew the vines for them last year, she would look at her son exactly this way. 

_Are **you** okay?_ The words are screamed back at him, a mirror of his own crinkled brow.

If it wasn't for the center frugal whatever-the-fuck force holding them down, he knows her fingers would be at her lips. A worry stone, something to gnaw on. 

It’s familiar in a way that feels wrong in this moment. They have a potential war criminal with them. For as badly as he's treated her, for as hard as he has tried to push her away today, he doesn't deserve that look. They don’t know where their children are, or how to keep them safe. Murray Fucking Bauman just handed them their emotional asses on a platter. Sexual tension. 

It occurs to him then that maybe they are being stupid. Maybe the words they have been spitting at one another are just empty promises. The real words exist here, in the silent care they share, and in her tiny fingers lacing themselves with his.

The thought pushes the black hole away long enough. He squeezes back. 

# "Close it now!"

The noise around him is deafening. Henderson's shriek is just loud enough to puncture through it, and it's enough to deaden it.

Hopper knows about noise cancellation. Some big shot in New York came up with it, used the idea to stop pilots from going deaf in the war. Now, standing next to the Key, he understands it. It is when two sounds, overlapping each other in a scientific duet, create silence. 

There is silence in this moment, his eyes meeting Joyce's across the distortion of electricity. Detective Byers. Jesus. It _does_ have a good ring to it.

She falters. He can feel it in the charged air and see it in the wrinkle on her brow. That look again. The silent question. 

_Are you okay?_

He can barely make her out now, his vision blurring. He's crying. So much of their best conversations have been non verbal. The black hole allowed for only so much talking, preferring a brush of fingers over a shared cigarette. A hand grasping for his outside of the snow ball. A worried squint in a space filled with carnival music.

Or a smile and an incline of his head.

He knows now, in this second when she looks down and he takes a step back, that he has already told her he loves her. 

He knows that she has done the same. He wished he would have listened. He hopes against hope that she did.

He wonders if this is how Bob felt.

He stumbles, and the black hole rushes up to meet him. Better it take him than her. Better he jump now, through the Gate, than have her see him. Better he wait, with the sound rushing back into his ears, than give Joyce Byers anything else to regret.

**Author's Note:**

> I immediately needed to touch on some problems that Hopper has. I love him as a character, but so much of ST3 can be summarized by "Jim, eat a snickers. You're not you when you're hungry." He's got SERIOUS control issues, and any time he started to lose it, it felt as if something darker was coming into play, something constant, always there, and self-inflicted.
> 
> Enter The Black Hole, his own personal demon. It isn't an excuse to be a fuckboy, but hopefully it comes across that he KNOWS he's being a fuckboy and feels guilty.
> 
> Also - in 'Three Inches,' he's watching True Grit, which came out in 1969. In that scene, the main character is with a younger girl who wants to hire him. He is drunkenly trying to arrest a rat and tells the rat so before smiling back to the little girl and telling her that the rat is just a rat and doesn't know what he's saying. He then shoots and kills the rat while the girl makes a face that can only be described as D8.
> 
> Find me on Tumblr @Tightropeflea!


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